December 20, 2007

So it totally feels like everyone I know is having a kid or thinking about having a kid.I am suddenly surrounded by big-bellied women and teeny-tiny hats and socks.It’s scary.

And while many of those soon-to-beparents are good friends, I don’t yet feel a real connection with the tiny little person any of them are bringing forth into the world.Maybe it’s because I haven’t met said tiny people, or seen enough pictures to actually be able to tell any of them apart from one another, but whatever the case may be, I’m just not THERE yet with them.

Until Bradly.Other than a camera phone picture, I have not even seen this baby girl yet and I am blown away.Enamored, even.

Kaci Marie (Herion) Duke delivered Bradly Dawn at 6:14am on December 20.She is 6 lbs 5.5 oz, and 20 inches long. She is the first newborn baby I have ever seen that looks like a sweet BABY and not some weird-shaped bruised alien THING.She’s really damn cute.

Kaci is Chandra’s baby sister and to see her with a baby of her own just about knocks me on my ass.I met Kaci when she was in 9th grade.9th grade!!!We’ve had slumber parties at the Herion house, she has been doing my hair since the days we will lovingly refer to as the “shakira roots incident,” and we’ve laughed A LOT.She’s always done her own thing and walked her own path and has constantly inspired me to try new things and not go with the flow just because it’s the flow. I am so so impressed with the woman she has grown up to be.

Welcome to the world, Baby Bradly!Follow in your mama’s fabulous footsteps and you’ll do just fine ;)

December 18, 2007

Clearly, December has been a bit busy.I have posted a link to SOMEONE ELSE’S BLOG so that you can still have something interesting to read when you happen upon my page, and one Christmas survey.And really, for as busy as we’ve been, I haven’t got a whole lot to say.So I will just start typing and see where this leads.Always scary with me, but here we go anyway!

I've started my Christmas shopping, which is amazing because usually I don't start until around the 23rd. Yeah, you heard me--December 23rd. Booyah.I love buying gifts for people, but hate hate hate the malls at Christmas time.I despise the mall normally, but aroundChristmas they are just insane and I can’t handle them.My mom and I went out last weekend though and had a great time (possibly aided by the 7 or so mimosas we drank at Chandra’s house prior to going to the mall…hee) and I made a dent in my list.Go me.

Work hasn’t slowed down at all, which is both bad and good.Bad in that I never get a moment of free time and end up writing this on my lunch break, and good because I never get a moment of free time and my day fucking flies.Seriously.I feel like I sit down at my computer at a quarter to 8 and the next time I look up it’s 5.It’s awesome.My yearly raise should be decided this week, and our office Christmas party is Friday, and then 2 weeks of 4 –day weekends are coming up, so I have little to complain about as far as work goes.

SK has been sick, finally getting over it completely this past weekend.It never got to coughing and hacking and fever and grossness, but apparently his head felt not so good and he wore his cranky pants for a good portion of the beginning of December.As a result, his sleeping schedule was directly affected which, in turn, affected mine, and we have been going to sleep at 9pm every. single. night.Which, really…not gonna lie…has been pretty freaking fantastic.

We haven’t gone out on a weeknight in I don’t know how long, which is great for our bank accounts and makes Bella happy, but is a huge change for us.We used to go out all the time, to dinner and bars and friends houses and concerts.Didn’t matter what day of the week it was, we were down to drink and have a good time and spend too much money.I don’t know when the shift happened—we blame different things; SK, Bella and the fact that she needs attention all the time and Me, THE BUYING OF THE HOUSE that all of our extra money is going towards.Regardless, we have become a different set of people than we were even 8 months ago, and that freaks me the hell out.

I don’t want to be THOSE PEOPLE who never go out and never see their friends and stay holed up in their apartment and always complain of never having any money to do anything with.

One of my biggest issues with relationships has been the fear that being part of pair meant I would have to change into this person that I no longer recognized.That having a boyfriend meant that I would have to stay home all the time unless HE wanted to go out, and that I would have set nights that I would see my friends because all of my attention needed to go to HIM first.I have seen a lot of friends relationships go south because someone was too jealous or someone needed too much attention or someone was unwilling to compromise on even the littlest things.Probably why I never had a serious relationship in college…I never wanted to lose ME in the eventual US.

When I met and started dating SK, I realized that he was just as into hanging out with his friends and spending time by himself as I was.It’s definitely one of the things that attracted me to him.I was impressed by his ability to prioritize and make room for me in his life without making me his life.It was something I had never really looked for in a guy, because I didn’t know it was possible for someone else to think the same way as me when it came to stuff like that.In SK, I found that someone else.

He keeps teasing me that I used to be able to stay up later than him and was a bigger partier than he was when we first started dating.The response I throw back is, well you aren’t recovering from the last year and a half now, ARE YOU???

I’m not afraid of losing myself in our relationship because I know that SK wouldn't ever push for that to happen, and what's more important, I know he wouldn't let me, but I am afraid that we will become boring and I will fight against that HARD.I rationalize that we are just worn out right now and we need to recoup before the big end of the year parties start happening.

I also think we have just hit a nice place where it’s just as fun to stay home, cook dinner, sit on the couch and watch TV with the dog as it is to go out and spend money at a bar, and for me to announce that to the world and be 100% ok with that is a really, really big fucking deal.

December 13, 2007

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? If you get your present in a gift bag, you will know that yours was one of the last to get wrapped…I was out of steam and had to throw it in the bag. Don’t worry, I still love you.

2. Real tree or artificial? Liz, I love how you ignored all of your doctor’s advice and got a real tree anyway. You’re awesome ;)I have a fake one this year…lots of tree scented candles, though. LOTS.

3. When do you put up the tree? The weekend after Thanksgiving. I would have put it up in March, but SK forbid it. In turn, I have told him that if he wants the tree to come down, EVER, he is going to have to do it. Christmas trees year-round would make me happy.

4. When do you take the tree down? When SK decides to do it.

5. Do you like eggnog? Never had it. Don’t think I would like it. Egg as a drink? Gross.

6. What was your favorite gift received as a child? I got a pretty sweet 3-story Barbie house with an elevator one year.

7. Do you have a nativity scene? We do, we just don’t have it out. Not enough space in our apt!

8. Hardest person to buy for? SK. Well, he’s not hard to buy for, but he’s hard to surprise. Mostly because I want to tell him what I got him as soon as I buy it. I’m not a good secret keeper.

10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? One year an aunt was working at Mervyn’s during the holiday season and she gave us all clothes from there. Not such a bad deal, until I went to try and return the shirt because it was too small and I found that I could get exactly $2.13 worth of something else at Mervyn’s. She had shopped on the clearance rack AND used her discount, so I basically could exchange my too small shirt for a sock. Count ‘em—ONE.

11. Mail or email cards? When I remember to, mail. We haven’t gotten ours out yet this year, though.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Um…about that… I haven’t actually started yet. I KNOW. I am thinking about it though. I will get some, hopefully all, done on Saturday. 2 years ago was the worst. I had to work up to Dec 23rd, and decided to go shopping that night after work. December 23rd, people! And I went to the mall. It took me 25 minutes to find a parking spot, no lie, and I ended up calling my mom and screaming into the phone, “how pissed will everyone be if they DON’T get Christmas presents from me this year?!?!” I always end up putting it off until the last possible moment and then I usually shop frantic and mad. Which is weird because I LOVE buying gifts for people. Sigh…I need to work on my shopping discipline.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Recycled as in put it in the recycle bin because I was done with it (ie—consumed bottles of liquor from my brother) or recycled as in re-gifted? Because I’ve done both.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Gyoza. Think Japanese rice paper tacos. SO GOOD. Reminds me of Christmas in Lompoc, with all of the family. And the smell stays in the house for days, so it feels like it makes Christmas last longer.

16. Clear lights or colored on the tree? I like both, but our tree this year came pre-lit with colored lights. I’m not a themey Christmas tree person…none of the shit on my tree matches. And I love it that way.

17. Favorite Christmas song? I love any and all Trans Siberian Orchestra Christmas stuff. I also am a fan of Sarah McLaughlin’s Wintersong album. But really, I like it all.

18. Travel for Christmas or stay at home? Either. I’d love to spend Christmas with all of the family, but alas…we’re stuck in Houston.

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeers? Really, Rudolph is the only important one.

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Star. We had an angel one year a loooooong time ago and it was like, animatronic and looked like it was flying at you. It was a possessed angel.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? We used to go to my dad’s parent’s house on Christmas Eve and do a big dinner and open presents from them and that side of the family. My mom and dad would bring 2 of the presents they got for us to open that night. The rest was done on Christmas morning at my mom’s parent’s house. There were more little kids on my mom’s side of the family so Christmas morning was a bigger deal to them.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? OHMYGOD Liz if you made a “Carmen’s Christmas Sweater” calendar I would SO buy one. I am guessing a lot of former So.Cal Rainbow girls would too! For me, it’s just the traffic. Houston traffic is already terrible, but throw a holiday into the mix and it’s really almost unbearable. Also, I hate that the weather in Houston can’t ever make up its mind about whether or not to be cold. Hmmmm….80 degrees with 100% humidity Christmas, or 40 degrees and insanely windy? Who can tell?!

23. What I love most about Christmas? Everything! I love decorating, I love buying and wrapping presents—when I can manage to do it in a timely fashion, I love hanging out with family and seeing friends that aren’t always in town, and I love the music and movies. When the weather is as it should be, Christmas is wonderful.

December 7, 2007

Unlike me, she has a very interesting blog--about a coyote she "adopted" when he has 10 days old. Really, it's a beautiful story about her experiences in cohabitation with a wild animal and the choices she's making daily in letting him be the free-spirited soul nature created, while making sure he doesn't eat her leg off in the middle of the night.

November 29, 2007

Happy birthday, little brother! 23 will be a good year for you. I can feel it.

**If you haven’t noticed, the last few days of November are big for my family. There are birthdays and anniversaries all over the place. This makes for some sweet parties when Thanksgiving break falls over these 3 days.

Kevin and I are 19 months apart, almost to the day. Up until just this moment I had always thought we were 18 months apart. I had just never actually counted. Brother, you are one more month younger than me. Ha.

When Kevin came home from the hospital, he didn’t stay long. I don’t know if I was excited about having a little brother or if I hated the idea. No one has ever told me. I just know that I was pissed when he was taken back to the hospital and my mom and dad went with him. For a month.

The poor kid was having SEIZURES.

Of course, I remember none of this, but from what I hear it was a pretty scary time for everyone. I don’t know the reason he had them, I just know that all of the first born boys on my dad’s side of the family has had them. Unless you are the first born son of a middle child. Apparently, if the father didn’t have them at birth, then the kids won’t either. And we have yet to determine whether or not they skip girls (me) or if it really just skips the middle kid (also me…Michael was dad’s first and he had them too).

Basically, the best way to conclude whether or not a child with Wittmann blood will or will not have seizures is to throw all of our names onto a huge Sodoku board and try to figure it out. Good fucking luck with that.

So he comes home FINALLY right before Christmas and was a pretty chill kid (thanks in part to the mass amounts of drugs he was on to subdue the seizing), which was AWESOME for me. Someone smaller than me who didn’t argue EVER when I told him what to do? FUCKING RIGHT!

I talked for him constantly. The pediatrician finally told my mom that she needed to shut me the hell up if she ever wanted to hear Kevin speak.

Thus establishing Kevin’s trademark character attribute; the guy does not speak unless absolutely necessary. I don’t know if I did this to him as a child—I’ll take credit for it anyway, thankyouverymuch—or if this is something he inherited from my father (no dad, you have NOT always talked as much as you do now), but if you have ever spoken to him on the phone, you know how true this is.

Which is why my brother and I rarely call each other. My mom always asks if we’ve talked when we haven’t seen each other in a while. My answer is always one of two things; “he called to say hi…that was it,” or “no,” which she never understands. Why don’t you talk to each other more often?

Because we don’t need to. It’s not that we don’t want to. We talk when we’re together. We love hanging out together. We have a large circle of mutual friends and we always have a great time doing whatever it is we end up doing when we see each other. But talking on the phone constantly is just not necessary with us.

He knows I am there when he needs me, just as I know he is there when I need him. He’s cashed in on that before and knows it’s an unconditional event; we can tell each other anything , knowing the other won’t judge, or, on the RARE occasion that it actually happens, we can just call to talk. But the phone calls aren’t obligatory.

He’s a cool guy, my brother. He’s figuring himself out and it’s neat to watch. He’s in between Austin and Houston right now, and possibly going back up north in the spring. He’s struggled and he’s persevered and he’s asked ME for advice which is just too awesome to express. He’s going to be successful, this I know.

And I hope he calls me when he hits it big. Even if it’s just to say hi, and that’s it.

Today is my parent’s 26th wedding anniversary. Woo hoo! Good job to them. Being ALIVE for 26 years sometimes sounds exhausting to me, never mind actually sharing that life with someone else for that long without killing them.

They do it with style, though. They laugh and spend time together and are just so cool. How lucky am I to have parents that not only I, but all of my friends, consider COOL?

They were married in 1981 in my grandparent’s living room. Their wedding was a big party and from what I hear, a great time.

Now, 26 years later, they are still having a blast. I hope that after being married for 26 years my husband still looks at me the way my dad looks at my mom. And checks out my butt as frequently, too.

So I’m a day late. Not unusual with me. Sorry, Matt. HAPPY BIRTHDAY anyway!

You’ve been my friend for somewhere in the range of 8 years now and I can’t imagine my life with you in it. You started out as the ONE guy in the group that never made fun of me…oh, how times have changed.

You’ve stolen my car (numerous times), lived at my house, and made road trips to Seguin…in the middle of the night. I got you drunk for the first time when I abandoned you with the baseball boys before St. Patty’s in ‘03. My bad, dude. I still have the dolphin that you and Keith and Scott got me for my 17th birthday, along with all of the memories from the Spring Break trip in Padre.

You’ve become part of my family and I love you tons! I’m so very thankful that our friendship has stayed strong for this long.

Happy birthday, Gallagher!

I would have made you a cake to commemorate the special day, but we all know you wouldn’t have eaten it anyway… ;)

November 21, 2007

I love everything about them. The shopping, the deciding, the returning, the wrapping, the food, the gifts and yes, even the family.

Especially the family.

My family is insane. Really. They are nuts.

But that is what makes them SO! MUCH! FUN! They welcome everyone, whether they know you or not, and within 15 minutes will have you rolling on the floor in a puddle of your own pee because you are laughing so hard you think you just might die. And you would die with a smile on your face, so see? They’re awesome.

My family is big. My mom is the middle of 5 kids, all of whom now have their own spouses and children and pets and issues, and my dad is the oldest of 3 with all of the same. Take off the shoes. It’s ok. I know there is a lot of math to be done there.

Holidays in California were always spent with ALL of the family. Occasionally there would be an aunt/uncle/cousin group missing because they were Air Force or Navy and living in some exotic locale like the Philippines or Hawaii for the year and couldn’t come home. But usually there were all of us, crammed into my grandmother’s 3 bedroom house, with food EVERYWHERE and babies crying and drunk aunts laughing and uncles filling up water bed mattresses with air for the kids and dogs to jump on.

We even celebrated Veteran’s Day like this. I’m not lying even a little when I say that any excuse for my whole family to get together was one big freaking party.

So you can imagine how sad our first big holiday in Texas was. It was Thanksgiving and we had been in Houston for about 2 and half months. I remember feeling like our 4-person family was so small. So tiny. How would we be able to celebrate without everyone else?

My mom cooked like she normally did, which meant we had Thanksgiving leftovers for 5 months because she cooked for 37 people instead of just the 4 of us. The cooking of the food was always a big deal in our family. I remember everyone getting together at my grandma’s house the night before Thanksgiving and helping out and it being LOUD. There was laughing and singing and dancing and yelling and it was fantastic.

It was just too quiet that first year, on the night before Thanksgiving. My mom was cooking, using her mom’s recipes and trying so desperately not to cry into the sweet potatoes. Kevin and I were moping around, as usual, and my dad was trying to keep everyone’s spirits up by convincing us that a holiday without the rest of the family would be fun and new and exciting. As you would expect, these attempts at perking us up were met with A LOT of eye rolling and heavy sighs.

As a last ditch effort to pull us out of the funk we were all in my dad threw my new Santana single, Smooth, into the CD player and started dancing around with my mom. And she laughed and started dancing too. Kevin and I held out through the first rotation of the song, gaping at my mom and dad like they were crazy, but when we realized my dad had set it on repeat and turned it up even louder than before, we folded and started jamming out with them.

That night is my first real happy memory of Texas. And it still amazes me that it came out of a time when we were all so sad and lonely for our family in another place.

Every year, no matter where we are living at the time, my brother and I get home with enough time to help cook the night before. We put on Santana and dance around the kitchen and celebrate the fact that all 4 of us are together again. And for that, I am so thankful.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Eat more than you should, drink until your nose goes numb, and love the hell out of your family.

Because really, everyone needs a little crazy in their lives to be grateful for.

Bella got spayed on Sunday.She is now what Kevin and Chandra lovingly refer to as an “empty vessel.”They call Abbi a “shell of a dog,” and frequently reference her as “hollow.”It’s quite hilarious.Until Abbi gets pissed about the comments and tries to bite your face off.Bella has a much bigger mouth than Abbi, so I am going to try and refrain from calling her those names while she is in the same room.Her bite would take off a hell of a lot more than the tip of my nose.

I started arranging for her to be spayed about a month ago.She is 7 months old, and I’m not completely certain when dogs go into heat, but I figured it was probably soon for her.And even though the carpet in our apartment is less than perfect I don’t need any new gross stains, if you know what I’m sayin’.

So I call our vet and set up an appointment and ask some questions about what we need to do beforehand to get her ready to be butchered.And since we are living on a crazy tight budget, I had to ask the money question.

“By the way, how much will it be?”

“Well how much does she weigh?”

“About 55 pounds.”

“Ok, then it will probably be around….um…300 or 350.”

“DOLLARS?!”

Needless to say, I started looking for other places to get her fixed.Turns out, the Humane Society spays and neuters animals for $60, AND they are open weekends.I made an appointment with them and then called my vet to cancel the one I had just made with her.

“No problem!The Humane Society is a great place to get it done.We’re more expensive because we’re a private practice, but she will be just fine with them.If anything seems off with her after the surgery, bring her in to us and we will see her for free.No problem at all.”

I love you, Heights Veterinary Clinic!

So I wake up Sunday, leave SK asleep in the apartment, and take unsuspecting little Bella down to get her womanly parts extracted.She was NOT happy as we sat there waiting for them to come get her.She had her tail between her legs, was shaking, and kept looking at me like, Lady, I can SMELL the badness that is this place.What the fuck am I doing here?!?I’m not exaggerating at all when I tell you that when they walked her back and she threw me one last sad, pleading look, my heart broke a little.

We picked her up that afternoon and after sitting in the waiting room for what felt like FOREVER they called our name and she came trotting out.TROTTING.Not kidding.Her tail was wagging, she had happy Bella face, and minus the goop around her eyes from being out for a few hours, she pretty much looked like she was coming off a sweet day at a doggie spa.Glad I spent my afternoon worrying while she spent hers getting massaged and pampered.

Once she got in the car though, she crashed out.She sat in the back seat with SK and really didn’t move at all.We laid her on the bed in the extra room when we got home and there she stayed all evening long.We even ate dinner on the bed right next to her and she never once lifted her head.She was so stoned.

She’s been sleeping in our room, in her kennel, so that I can hear her if she cries or starts to mess around with her stitches.They told me to check her stitches every day to make sure that they looked ok and weren’t doing anything weird or gross.Ew.So I check her stomach on Monday and I swear to God I can’t even see where they stitched her up!I’m guessing that’s good…?I mean, I can tell where the incision was made, but her stitches look pretty non-existent, and she doesn’t seem to be in any pain so I am happy with that.What I DID see though was odd…

She has a tat.

Yep.She has a tattoo!My 7 month old DOG has a tattoo.I don’t even have a tattoo!And to be quite honest with you, I have no fucking clue what it is.It is like a little circle with a cross through it.The weirdest thing, though, is that it’s nowhere close to where the stitch line is.It’s like 7 inches down from there, close to the inside of her right hind leg.WTF??

SK and I have been making up stories about what it could mean.Is she in a Humane Society cult?Did the doctor mess up and cut the wrong place?Is she now missing a kidney or something?Keep her away from the booze!

I like to think she did something crazy while waiting to be spayed.Like bit someone’s hand off as they were approaching her with the anesthesia.Because she was so wild and scary, they branded her for life.Now everyone will see her ink and know SHE is the crazy motherfucker that caused all the trouble on the south side of town.

November 16, 2007

I was all set to write about how I saw the girl turning the direction that would make me left-brained and why that confused and upset me because I have always considered myself to be more right-brained, when all of a sudden she changed direction.

DOES THAT NOT BLOW YOUR MIND?!?!

All of sudden I look back up and she’s spinning the other way. Now, every time I look at her she is changing course. Not gonna lie…it’s starting to make me a little dizzy and sick.

So apparently I use both sides of my brain. Go ahead, call me a genius. I know.

Really, I have always thought I was more right-brained as those traits tend to lean more towards being artsy and imaginative and ouside-of-the-box thinking. Read: flighty. Which is exactly what I am. Most of the time. I love to read and would be happy if you put me in a corner all day with a book and some food. I routinely forget things I just said. I am not a fan of structure. I hate math and anything numbers-driven. I freaked out and cursed the science Gods when I took chemistry and found it to be Numbers Science.

WHAT?!

I had loved biology and all of the questions and theories behind the development of the species of the world. And then they sit me down in a class and give me a FORMULA to figure out how many protons and neutrons and electrons are in a certain element and if I get it wrong I am just WRONG, not kind of right, not going in the right direction, but WRONG.

I hate that box. The box with the ONE right answer. Hate it. Want to kick it and punch it and shred it and refuse to be placed in it EVER because HELLO—there is always more than one answer.

Which is why I have never thought I was left-brained. But then I see Silhouette Sally up there dancing in the left-brained direction and my self-perception shatters. Awesome. Thanks, Sal.

Thankfully, she started dancing the other way and all was right in my world again. But this then begs the question: am I REALLY as right-brained as I think I am? Really, I mean a wrong-way dancing silhouette just almost destroyed me, so obviously I am not as stable as I once thought, but that is neither here nor there. But am I truly right-brained?

I think that so often we want to see ourselves in such a way that we don’t really take the time to figure out how others see us, or how we really should see ourselves. I want to think that I am creative and artsy, but when you feel the need to SAY you’re a certain way, doesn’t that usually mean you’re really NOT that way at all, and just trying to make yourself FEEL like you are?

I am logical, which is left-brained. I have a crazy vocabulary, which I am proud of, which is also a left-brained trait. I am safe in that I won’t go jumping into oncoming traffic just for the rush, but not so safe that I would stay in a situation that made me unhappy just because it was comfortable. I can be detail-oriented, but usually you have to remind me it’s necessary. I can comprehend concepts and ideas typically on the first listening of said concept or idea. But I don’t think linear, and I am a procrastinator to the point that it’s almost ridiculous, and neatly arranged piles of ANYTHING cause me to break out in hives and will almost certainly send me flying off the handle.

So, clearly, I am still working on which side of my noggin is ultimately going to end up doing the driving. To the 4 readers I have, where do you fall on the left/right curve? Which way do you see her twirl? And really, it’s ok to admit it if, at first glance, you violently cuss her. Like I did.

November 15, 2007

Here is the the official Halloween picture (finally) of our little household. I'm thinking this would make a fabulous Christmas card. I was decked out to look like an 80's chick, thanks to Chandra and her Never-Ceases-to-Amaze-Me wardrobe. SK was Speed Racer, a costume he has had for a few years. Like the slippers? Yeah, he wore those to walk across the stage at his COLLEGE GRADUATION. Mmm hmm.

Happy (late) Halloween from Cheryl, Bella and Speed!

**Notice the drool all around Bella's mouth hole in her ghost costume. That's because until about 5 seconds prior to this picture being taken, she didn't HAVE a mouth hole. It was pretty gross.

November 10, 2007

As most of you know, Bella dressed up as a ghost for Halloween. A blue ghost, actually. Only because the only white pillowcases we have are nice ones and I didn’t want to cut one of those up.

Before you start gagging yourselves and saying how laaaaaame it is to dress your pets up for the night and yada yada yada….ok, who am I kidding? I know that like 4 people read this and that ALL OF YOU dressed your pets up too!

So I’ll just get to the pictures. Hee.

First, an action shot.

We used a king-size pillowcase and I cut two front leg holes in it for her. I slipped it over her head, pulled her front legs through, and was in the process of trying to figure out where her little eye holes should go when she started running around like that. I guess she didn’t realize she couldn’t see…? She kept trying to run to us based on what she could hear. She wasn’t freaking out or anything, just trying to run and play like she would when she wasn’t Blind Pillowcase Wearing Dog.

Needless to say, SK and I were crying we were laughing THAT HARD.

Our Ghost Bella.

Reason #2

Today is Saturday and I am awake and SK isn’t. I got out of bed, took Bella downstairs, fed her and sat down to write this because I have been getting death threats about posting the Ghost Bella pictures and how if they weren’t up TODAY I would be sorry.

This really isn’t any different than our normal morning routine, except SK is always gone by now and usually Bella is chilling in the bathroom or our bedroom, chewing on a toy, while I get ready for work. I guess because of the pace at which I did everything this morning, which was significantly less rushed than on a work day, she knows today is different. And she knows SK is still here.

Right now she is alternately crying at our bedroom door and slamming her head into it, trying to get through to SK on the other side. How she knows he is in there, I don’t know. He’s not a snorer, the TV isn’t on…I guess she can hear him breathing? Scary.

Should I stop her from potential brain damage as a result of all the head bashing? I could. But watching her RUN FACE FIRST INTO MY BEDROOM DOOR is too hilarious right now.

November 9, 2007

Scene: I am standing at the "Christmas Ideas" book table, looking through a book about snowflakes by some guy who apparently collected a shitload and then found a way to keep them frozen long enough to shine multicolored lights through them to illustrate how amazingly complex they are. Enter 2 Teenage Girls. They stop at the same table, and are on my right. One points to a book about the Kennedy family...Action.

Girl 1: “Do you think he’s hot?”

Girl 2: “Who?”

Girl 1: “Him. That Kennedy guy. JFK or whatever.”

Girl 2: “Gaaawd NO! Is he supposed to be hot?”

Girl 1: “I guess. He was back in the day.”

Girl 2: “Gross! Maybe he’s hot now though. You know, like one of those guys that gets hotter when he gets old.”

From Free Will Astrology:Contrary to what the Bible says, it won't be the meek who shall inherit the earth. On the other hand, the arrogant power mongers won't collect the legacy either. Neither the indecisive wimps nor the acquisitive bullies will contribute much to creating the New World.

Who, then, will inherit the earth? What kind of human beings are best-equipped to thrive in the evolving game of life? We say it will be the well-disciplined pleasure-seekers who are in vigorous dialogue with their own dark sides, who balance the masculine and feminine aspects of their natures, and who master the fine arts of working at their play and playing at their work.

Hmmm…looks like I won’t be inheriting the earth anytime soon. Honestly, I never really thought this was an opportunity for me anyway, but now that I know it’s really going to the people who have all of their shit together? Well, really—who saw that coming?

For me to become one of those people I think I need to grow up about 15 years. It’s odd because just when I think I am doing well and have everything in order and finally have a handle on things, I do something like overdraft my bank account by $300, or drink way too much on a week night, or be unnecessarily mean to someone I love. I definitely do not have all of my shit together.

I sometimes wonder where I derailed. When I was younger, I knew exactly what I wanted to do when I grew up (a marine biologist), where I wanted to go to school (UC Santa Barbara, to major in marine biology), where I was going to live (on the beach in Santa Barbara, with a winter house in Hawaii), what my favorite animal was (dolphin) and even what my favorite color was (green). I don’t think the 14 year old me would be very impressed with the 24 year old me, and that bums me out.

I realized in high school that science was tough and that honestly, I wasn’t really that interested. That was hard for me to get used to, and I remember being really distraught about the fact that I wasn’t going to continue to take science classes after the required biology, chemistry and physics. I felt like a failure. It was my first real experience with “giving up” on a dream.

After that, I tried changing my attitude towards my future. I decided to let it come to me instead of trying to make myself fit into this vision of perfection that I was creating in my mind.

I have a very real problem with imagining how things “should be” and not realizing that the expectations I am setting for others and myself are really REALLY unrealistic. Ask my mom. Let her tell you about the many times when I was young and came out of my room BAWLING because the idea of the black socks with the blue dress that I had in my mind really didn’t look so good in real life. I am not kidding.

So I have tried to keep this mentality of “let life happen” going. Sometimes I am not so good at it and I get really disappointed with where I am. Most of the disappointment comes from where I am professionally, because 14 year old me really thought that we would be taking over the world by now. Or that we would have at least made our first billion.

But I am finding that it’s when I try to control everything that is going on in my life, that’s when it all falls apart. When I freak out and obsess, all it does it stress me out and I start taking out my frustrations on the parts of my life that are awesome and there is a severely damaging chain reaction that ensues.

I have been told numerous times in the past year “ if you want to make God laugh, make plans.” While I am not a religious person, this always makes me think. There is obviously something bigger out there, and while I am not sold on the idea of a life plan being previously mapped out for me, I know that I have a purpose. And I know that if I quit trying to MAKE things fit the way I want them to, I will someday be able to see what that purpose is.

I just need to chill out and be ok with the fact that I really don’t have my shit together. And that just because where I thought I would be at 14 is not where I am now, that doesn’t make me a sell out or a bad person. So what if I don’t inherit the Earth? I wasn’t ever one of the meek ones anyway.

Today when I was listening to the radio on my way to work one of the DJ’s was bitching about how Christmas keeps coming earlier and earlier every year. He said he was floored that radio stations have already gone “all holiday” and are playing Christmas music at the beginning of November. He thought it was lame and that we should wait until AFTER Thanksgiving to start getting ready for the Christmas season.

To that I say SCREW YOU DUMB DJ.

If I could celebrate Christmas all year long I would. And I don’t mean just the feeling of Christmas because we all know we’re supposed to be nice and help out and extend the giving throughout the entire year and blah blah blah.

I mean that I would keep Christmas lights on my house forever. I would keep candles burning that smelled like apple pie and mistletoe and spice. I would keep a damn Christmas tree in my living room for 12 months straight if I could keep anything green alive for that long.

Christmas just makes you feel GOOD. It makes people happy. True it makes some people sad, but I have never understood those people.

I am going to start listening to Christmas music now. I will change the hold music in my office to Christmas tunes. Who cares if it’s not Thanksgiving yet? Not this girl.

Who’s with me? You know you want to do it…give in to your inner tacky sweater, reindeer earring wearer. Bah Humbug to the haters.

October is over and I really can’t tell you how big of a relief that is.Work has been insane.I won’t ever write about my work in this blog—I have read horror stories of people who used their public blogs as an outlet for their work woes, which is just really dumb because hello—we live in the Google Age, and were fired for it. Not that I think my boss or any of my coworkers read this, but it wouldn’t be hard for them to find it if they looked.So that’s all I’ll say.It has been INSANE.

And while I love Halloween, October just always feels like a very loooooooong month.It feels like it takes forever to get to the end of it and then BAM! BAM! BAM!It’s holiday city.And that makes me happy.

There are a lot of great things to look forward to this month—friend’s birthdays, my parent’s wedding anniversary, my brother’s birthday, THANKSGIVING, a few days off work, and then finally FINALLY putting up a Christmas tree and decorating.

October 30, 2007

I was writing an e-mail to the lovely Miss Karen Smyth, recounting the events of the fabulous Wedding Weekend, when I realized that I am really fucking busy.

All the time.

I mean, I’ve always had stuff to do on the weekends because of sports growing up and then because of the sorority and all the completely necessary parties in college, so it’s not anything new.

But when I was in junior high and high school, none of the activities I was running around doing involved alcohol, so other than occasionally being sore from a hard workout or from swimming my ass off at a meet, there was no recovery time needed the next day. In college, if I was exhausted I would just skip my morning class to grab a few extra hours of sleep or just to enjoy the silence of an empty apartment.

Now, I can’t just skip work or sleep a few extra hours and roll into the office at 11. Weird, I KNOW. And now on my weekend adventures there is almost always alcohol involved, so one or more of the days is spent not feeling so great and cussing all the Coors Light I drank the night before.

And being busy while I was single is not even close to the busy I am now that I am part of a pair. Not only do I have MY stuff to do and MY friends to see, I also have HIS stuff to make room for on my calendar. I can probably count on one hand the number of weekends SK and I have spent alone in the almost 2 years we’ve been dating.

I am tired.

I can’t even remember the last time I didn’t feel tired, or sleepy, or groggy. I never wake up feeling completely rested and refreshed. Ever.

But instead of taking a night off, or even (gasp!) a whole weekend off, I continue to push myself and I keep making plans.

And before you start screaming at the computer screen or bashing your head repeatedly into the closest hard surface while saying out loud “THEN JUST QUIT FUCKING PLANNING SHIT!” let me tell you something;

I like it.

I love it, actually.

I love to plan. I love to be busy. I have always worked better under pressure—yes, I am a huge procrastinator—and I seem to focus better when I am going in a million directions all at once. I enjoy coordinating things and getting lots of people together at any kind of event. I make lists and spreadsheets and write down notes in my calendar. SK still gets amazed that I can recite all of our weekend plans in August when he asks me in March.

SK knew I was a planner right from the beginning, though. The first voicemail message I ever left him was a play-by-play of my LIFE. He was trying to ask me out on a date and I was busy every night but one for the approaching 2 weeks, so I told him about it. On his cell answering machine. Really. I was pretty embarrassed when I FINALLY hung up and realized I had given him an explanation of each of my next 14 days. He thought I was trying to be snobby and show him how popular I was. I was actually just really nervous and went to a place where I was safe—My Planning Place.

It started with that first message and it’s been going full force ever since. I am lucky that I found someone who puts up with the busy-ness. Someone who tolerates all the scheduling and list-making. Someone who can understand that while it is SO important that I know TODAY what we are doing for Easter NEXT YEAR, I could give a flip about how much money I currently have in my checking account, and love me for it all the same.

I love that SK and I are so busy that it feels like we never have time for a date. Because that’s not true at all. We always make time for a date night, or a stay at home and watch tv night, or a let’s ignore the dog’s I have to pee NOW! howls and sleep in a few more hours weekend morning. Being so busy and always having something to do, somewhere to go, and someone else around makes the time we are alone in our little apartment so much sweeter. We really appreciate each other in those quiet moments and I love that.

Almost as much as I love being busy.

I get antsy when I have nothing to do. I always say that a weekend of “nothing” would be divine, but I honestly think I would have a panic attack in my apartment and have to run hysterically to the Galleria and regroup in the food court just so I could be around people.

I don’t know where that comes from. I don’t want to explore that further here because this is probably something I need to go spend thousands of dollars on to figure out. And I don’t want to open THAT door.

Being busy means that I have lots of people who love me in my life, and who like for me to be around. Being busy means that I am lucky. I am so grateful for all of the friends I have made and for all of the friendships I have been able to keep strong throughout the years. To me, being busy means that SK and I have our priorities in order, and that we prove on a daily basis that our lives are not full without the ones we love in it.

So if you hear me bitching and moaning about how busy we always are and how tired I always am, just slap me. Hard. And then show me this blog. Because really, I have nothing to complain about. Sometimes I just need to be reminded of that.

October 24, 2007

I love the Food Network. Seriously. Love it. I watch it all the time. I watch the Food Network like most people watch the news. It IS my news. Something big happening with pumpkin recipes? I am the first to know because I am tuned in all day. Something big happening with oil prices? I probably won’t hear about that for at least a few weeks because who has time for real world news when there are so many good shows to watch on channel 231?

The only show that I can’t watch is Everyday Italian, with Giada De Laurentiis . She is way too toothy and her jaw looks like it sometimes comes unhinged, which totally creeps me out. Really girl, shut your mouth.

I especially like the challenges. Once a month or so they do a whole show on some sort of challenge—best pie, craziest birthday cake, best bbq—and one show last year was about garlic. Apparently there is a garlic festival in Gilroy, CA each year and it’s a pretty big deal. SK and I were watching the show together and we were laughing hysterically—Garlic Festival?? Gross! I like garlic, but wow. These people were getting CRAZY with the garlic, too. Even putting it in ice cream and cakes. Barf.

Anyway, we were in California this summer and were driving south from San Francisco when we hit a wall of traffic. Seriously, we were NOT moving. We were trying to make it to the Monterey Bay Aquarium and I was getting really frustrated with the way the car was going nowhere. I think the words, “I seriously better be seeing a dead body somewhere on the road up here,” actually came out of my mouth. We were with our friend, Matt, and he suddenly goes, “oh day-umm! I know why there is so much traffic. It’s Garlic Fest!”

Um, excuse me? The same Garlic Fest I laughed at a year ago? Yep. That one.

To be honest, I didn’t even know where Gilroy was in California so it had never occurred to me that we might actually see it while we were making our north to south crawl through the state. And really? They do the garlic thing EVERY YEAR?

So we FINALLY get through the traffic and see that yes, it really IS because people are crazy about getting to the festival and diving head-first into a bowl of fried garlic cloves. After an hour of sitting outside the town and being so incredibly pissed off that I was missing the aquarium because of a bunch of garlic-crazed freaks, we blew by Gilroy. I loathe Gilroy.

SK’s sister is getting married this weekend. Yay DK! There is all kinds of family coming in for the big event, and SK’s Aunt Kerry and Uncle Art are going to be staying with us. Kerry and Art are awesome. We stayed with them while we were in California (after experiencing The Traffic From Hell outside of Gilroy. Ugh, Gilroy.) and they were so great.

It is important to mention here that we arrived at Kerry and Art’s on a Thursday. Kerry had just returned from the hospital after having a heart attack on Monday. And she still hung out and made us feel completely welcome and comfortable in her home. The woman is amazing.

Kerry and Art get here tonight, so SK and I have been cleaning like mad. We usually keep our apartment pretty tidy, but it wasn’t until I went in to clean the bathroom that I realized really how untidy our place was. I apologize to all of you who have ever used my bathroom for ANYTHING in the past few months. I solemnly swear that from this day forward my bathroom will be clean and completely un-gross. I attacked it with everything I had under the sink and left it smelling like bleach and being all shiny and wonderful.

SK did the bulk of the cleaning, as he always does, and I did the bathroom and kitchen. I bought some new candles that smell like vanilla and baked apple pie, so our apartment smelled good enough to eat. The floors were sparkly and the balconies were swept and all the laundry was even done. Nothing left to do but keep it clean last night. Clean for about 6 hours.

Um, about that…

What did I, brain-child that I am, decide to make for dinner last night? GARLIC SHRIMP. I know, I know...

The meal was fantastic, but now my super clean apartment smells like freaking GILROY and all I want to do is cry.

October 18, 2007

I would like to think that people are inherently good. That, unlike the world-view held by some, everyone on Earth is not out to screw you over. I think that people, given the choice between being malicious and wicked or kind and helpful, will choose kind and helpful. Generally.I say this because the people I know are nice people. They are friendly unless given a reason to behave otherwise, say, like if your name is Treasure.I mean, COME ON. Who can be nice to someone named Treasure?! I know. But overall, the people in my life are good-hearted individuals who will help a person in need, avoid suicidal squirrels that try to kill themselves under their cars, and who love dogs. Really—never trust someone who doesn’t love dogs. That is just weird. Apparently, though, I guess I don’t know enough people.

A woman hit my car last week, in the parking garage at my office. She left a card, which was nice, but I am starting to think the only reason she did was because it happened IN the parking garage and that this woman truly has no moral center and would have just left my poor car, scratches and all, if it hadn't been right outside our building.

But I am getting ahead of myself.

The resolution to the unprovoked attack on my car actually started out kind of marvelously AWESOME. My company has 2 reserved spots in the parking garage. My boss parks in one and the other was originally intended for me. I get to the office between 7:40 and 8 every morning, when there are lots and lots of open spots, so I usually just take one of those and let someone else from my office who arrives later have the reserved spot. The spots I park in are small, but then again so is my car, and so are most of the other cars in our parking garage. So on the day of said car attack I park for the morning, go out to lunch around 1, and then drive back into the parking garage. Someone had taken my morning spot so I cruised up to the second level where our reserved spots are and parked in one of them. It is important to note here that the car to right of me, on the side that the damage was sustained, was now my bosses car which is a big ass RED Nissan.

Got that? Red. Ok. Just making sure you’re still following.

So I go in to finish my work day. I leave at 5 and drive home. I park in our designated spot and walk up to the apartment. SK and I left again a few minutes later to go to the grocery store and when we walked down to my car SK was the one to notice the scratches first.

“Holy shit Cheryl! Someone hit your car!”

“No way…where?”

“Uh, right there…see the big white scratches running down your side? I bet it was those close-parking motherfuckers in the white truck** that park next to you. Assholes.”

**The people who park to the right of me in the apartment lot usually park SO close that it is impossible for Bella to squeeze in between their car and mine. And Bella can squeeze her entire body through the bars of her kennel. She’s rubber-boned.

“Well, they left a note…HOLY CHRIST!! This chick works in my office building!”

“You mean you made it all the way home without that little business card flying off your car?”

“No. I mean I made it all the way to lunch and back and THEN all the way home without that little business card flying off my car!!”

I know. My jaw was on the floor. Thanks, God. That was pretty cool. So I am figuring with a great start like that, this whole experience won’t be too bad. I wasn’t even bummed about the scratches; I was so pumped about the staying power of that little business card.

I go in and call the lady who is SO nice that I start to feel bad about asking her to pay for the damage SHE did to MY car. She asks me to go get an estimate done and fax it to her because she would rather settle this without involving insurance which I am cool with because hey, I know where she works. It’s not like she is going to get away with not fixing my car. And she was just being so freaking agreeable and sweet.

I call Toyota on 249, where I bought my car and where I have all my maintenance work done, and ask them their hours.Turns out, their body shop is on I-45 and like, CONROE and they close at 6pm on weekdays and are not open weekends so unless I took the day off and went at 11 in the morning to avoid all the traffic there is no way that was going to work. So I get online and find a random place close to my office (red flags everywhere, I KNOW) and run over there on my lunch break on Monday. It's a little crappy looking place off Westheimer, but the people were nice and they were working on NICE cars, which I am now guessing were probably stolen--I almost took my baby to a chop shop!!!--so I thought, what the hell, I'll let them work on my car.The estimate was $522, plus the cost of a rental because they said they would have my car for 3 days. No big deal.

I fax the estimate to her and she balks. Thinks it's too high and that they shouldn't have my car that long because, oh I don't know, she's THE TOYOTA WHISPERER and knows everything about cars and the time it takes to heal them?

So I give up my lunch break today too, and go to a Toyota dealership that is really close to my office that I guess I had just never noticed before. I talk to the guy there and he gives me THEIR estimate which is, no big surprise, about twice as much as the first place. I ask why and show him the first estimate. Turns out, the first place was just going to basically pound out the dent and buff over the scratches and not even bother with matching the paint, which means that my beautiful, not even one year-old, that I bought all on my own and pay for all by myself, big-girl car would be TWO-TONED. I just stared at him. What? He nodded. Two-toned. As in, different colors. Like bowling shoes. NO FUCKING WAY.

I made up my mind at that precise moment that this man, this man who opened my eyes to the evils of the chop shop masquerading as a body repair center, would be my car’s savior. He would fix my car and take care of her and treat her as his own. And no way was this dude letting her come out two-toned.

Ugh. Two-toned. Even typing it makes me want to vomit a little.

But now I am kind of screwed. I have already sent The Hitter the first estimate and she lost her shit over that one. She was really going to flip out when I dropped the bomb that the place I now wanted to fix it would cost twice as much. So I called Denise, The State Farm SuperWoman. Denise has been handling our family’s car insurance since we moved to Texas, which means she and I know each other veeeery well.Denise has been with me through ALL of my moving violations, 90% of which involved destruction of a vehicle, either mine or someone else’s because of me. Denise is THE SHIT. She always finds a creative way to keep our insurance premiums down and has probably been the sole reason I never had my license revoked when I was a teenager and extremely prone to hitting non-moving objects. She kicks asses and takes names and always tells me exactly what to do.

“You should have called me Monday.”

“I know, my dad told me to, but I thought that since this lady was being so cool that it would be taken care of by now.”

I can hear her rolling her eyes on the other end of the line.

“Cheryl. No one is THAT nice.You call this woman and tell her that you do not have time to be doing HER insurance company’s job. You get her insurance information and you tell her that we will be in touch with them about this. If she doesn’t have insurance, then your No Insurance coverage will take care of that and you will only be out your $250 deductible. We will then go file with (some scary sounding institution) to get OUR money back for the cost of the repair as well as YOUR deductible. You should not be running around getting estimates for her. Why didn’t you call me MONDAY??”

So I call The Hitter. I tell her what I found out and that Toyota would be fixing my car and that yes, it was going to be more expensive. She, of course, freaks out. Have I mentioned she doesn’t speak English well?Yeah. She doesn’t. I am waiting for her to go off on me in Spanish, but she stays calm, only because I imagine she is sitting at her desk in her office, and tells me her husband will be in touch with me. I stay calm, only because I don’t really know all the rules with this kind of stuff and am slightly worried that if I let her have it and chewed her out like I am wanting to she will somehow be able to throw it back in my face and Denise will have to tell me that because I called this woman a dumb bitch over the phone that she is not responsible for fixing my car anymore. So I say ok, thank you, goodbye. I realize I have my right hand balled into a fist and I am squeezing so tight that my knuckles are turning white.

I am starting to lose faith in the goodness of people. This is not a good feeling. This has not been a good day.

Stay tuned for the continued saga of The Great Car Incident of 2007. I hope I get to see Denise whoop her ass.

October 17, 2007

October 16, 2007

Last night the heavens opened up and dumped tons and tons of rain on Texas, from Dallas to Houston.The sky turned black at 3pm and the wind picked up and the water came down.It didn’t stop until sometime early this morning.The best part, though, was the temperature drop—20 degrees in about and hour.It stayed relatively cool last night, and was even chilly enough this morning to throw on a light jacket for my drive to work.Every time something like this happens in the fall, I stupidly work myself up into believing that this, THIS will be the day that it starts cooling off for real and that when I leave my office in the evening it will still be cold and crisp with no hint of humidity in sight.Dumb Cheryl.

I was going through the pictures I have saved on my phone and was deleting some old ones. I never carry my actual camera with me, although I probably should, so I am pretty much a camera-phone using fool.Here are a few random frames for your viewing pleasure…

A pumpkin SK and I carved last year for Halloween. Notice the teardrop tat under his right eye. Our pumpkin was a true gangsta. Until, in very un-gangsta-like form, he melted into a puddle on my front porch. Humidity in October. It’s a killer.

My first Texans game. We won! I don’t remember the end, though. Tailgating was brutal.

The Christmas tree at Toby and SK’s condo on Heights Blvd. Toby bought the tree, I helped decorate, and SK was obsessive about picking up the pine needles. The one gift under the tree in this picture is actually an empty box that I wrapped up anyway. I bought SK some new cologne and body wash for Christmas and he wanted it RIGHT NOW…I wanted the tree to look pretty and loved, so I wrapped the box the cologne had been in.

Flowers from SK from a few months ago. I am a lucky girl ;)

This was Wine101 at Central Market, otherwise known as THE BEST CHRISTMAS PRESENT EVER. Toby, tired of hearing us say “this tastes like DRY,” and “um, all I can smell is alcohol,” when we would drink his nice wine, gave us tickets to a class that taught us how to smell, taste and grade different wines. It was taught by the CM wine expert and was awesome. There was great food served along with the wines we tasted, and SK even had himself a little Wine Suicide. Ask him about it sometime. It’s Toby’s favorite part of our experience.

This is Bella in the kitchen about week after I brought her home.

This is Bella in the car with me about 3 weeks ago.

This is a shot at the Ghostland Observatory concert in January. I love Aaron Behrens.

About Me

Navigating newly-married life with a husband and a dog, in the Houston 'burbs. Laughing, drinking wine, and working hard during the week keep me going until the weekends. I love the hell outta my life.